Amazon outdoing PRISM

[Kumabjorn]

Originally Posted by Billi

and additionally it is explained in the link in the first post.

Never know where a link may take you.

[Xanthe]

They can try to target me all they want but they are doomed to failure for two reasons:

- my software strips out all ads

- they have yet to figure out a way to physically force my hand to open my wallet.

[MattW]

Originally Posted by xg4bx

Until Amazon has the power to arrest and indefinitely detain me for things I buy, I'm not too worried about targeted advertising and the like.

So Amazon collects and (presumably) stores the data. Then the government comes along, requests it (in one swoop with about a million other records), adds it to your movement profile they have from your cellphone carrier... and this doesn't worry you?

What sounded like a conspiracy theory a few months ago has been proven to be real. I agree, Amazon isn't likely to do much harm with this for now, but the thing that I find disturbing and wrong is the fact that it isn't necessary to collect this amount of private data for targeted advertising. They just do it because they can. And because almost nobody really cares.

I don't buy this "If you don't have nothing to hide" argument for a second. Like Cory Doctorow said in a Guardian article (paraphrasing here): "Privacy is important. I know what you do in the bathroom, but you'd probably want to close the door anyway."

This is my life, and my private data. Granted, I do not install toolbars (and haven't installed the 1Button App), but I work in IT. I'm not your average Joe who thinks "Well this is great, it'll help me look for stuff on Amazon from anywhere on the web, what can be the harm?" and then has his whole web-surfing habits transmitted to Amazon.

At some point, I believe, we have to stop making excuses for the big companies and stop shrugging everything off. This amount of data collection should scare you. You'd think that folks who've read 1984 should know better.

I think it'd be funny if it weren't so scary. A country like the US that praises itself on freedom, where even background checks for guns get voted down because it could lead to a national database on gun owners (gasp!), collectively shrugs when the government routinely collects metadata on millions of its citizens and when corporations track your every move.

I don't want to sound like a conspiracy nut, but how is that not a problem?

To those who say "Don't like it? Don't install it?": yeah, fine, but first you'd need to know what it actually does to make an informed decision. And not only doesn't Amazon go out of its way to explain what the toolbar does before you install it, but it actually and wilfully misstates what it does and does not do in the privacy statement (read the article I linked to).

Sorry, but I think that should be illegal. You may disagree.

[MattW]

Originally Posted by Kumabjorn

Never know where a link may take you.

True enough. If only there was a way to find out, like clicking on it or something.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by MattW

To those who say "Don't like it? Don't install it?": yeah, fine, but first you'd need to know what it actually does to make an informed decision. And not only doesn't Amazon go out of its way to explain what the toolbar does before you install it, but it actually and wilfully misstates what it does and does not do in the privacy statement (read the article I linked to).

Sorry, but I think that should be illegal. You may disagree.

It is illegal to make such false statements - in the UK at least. It would be a breach of the Sale of Goods Act.

[DiapDealer]

Browser add-ons have always been a security/privacy nightmare. Why did Amazon's suddenly put you over the deep end?

[Kumabjorn]

Originally Posted by MattW

True enough. If only there was a way to find out, like clicking on it or something.

Point being that once you click on it, it is too late.

[MattW]

Originally Posted by Kumabjorn

Point being that once you click on it, it is too late.

So, basically you're saying that you never click on a link unless it's to a website that you already know? Your internet experience must be fun.

[DiapDealer]

I don't blindly follow links either. There's only about four places on the internet worth visiting anyway.

[Kumabjorn]

Originally Posted by MattW

So, basically you're saying that you never click on a link unless it's to a website that you already know? Your internet experience must be fun.

No, that is not what I'm saying at all.

Originally Posted by MattW

So, basically you're saying that you never click on a link unless it's to a website that you already know? Your internet experience must be fun.

You don't have to go to that extreme. It's more like: if the link's context makes it look dodgy, don't click it. I don't click on advertising. If a forum post is spam, I won't click on the links. I look for red flags in the descriptions provided by search engines, or even suspicious URLs. If I end up on a dodgy page, I back out rather than continue on.

It's not about visiting the same sites all of the time. It's about avoiding sites that lead you into that nether region where your machine will be compromised.

[MV64]

Originally Posted by Ken Maltby

I would say that the real answer is to make improper use of the data a Felony and have very high civil penalties awarded, if/when anyone gets caught misusing the data collected. The same for ignoring an opt out or lack of opt in violation. Additional penalties for any corporate coverup.

Luck;
Ken

Couldn't happen, since the government behaves much the same way now. If some group has your info, they're going to use it.

[jgaiser]

Originally Posted by JD Gumby

...yet no NoScript? Weird. :P

Yeah.. I like living out close to the edge...

Haven't tried it a while, but it was a bit too heavy handed for my tastes when I did. I'll have to try it again sometime.

[Loosheesh]

I'd never heard of the 1Button App before this thread and I didn't click the link. I simply pasted "1Button App for Chrome" in Google Search and I found out more. Revolutionary maybe, but surprisingly easy.

[Xanthe]

There's going to come a point, though, where the amount of data collected outweighs its usefulness. Right now the companies and alphabet agencies are in the first flush of lust with all the data that's out there for the taking. Sooner or later, though, they're going to realize that there's much more chaff than wheat in all that data they've got stored, and they can cross-file and cross-check it all they want, but its never going to reveal our inner selves to them. All they are going to get are the surface details, that we probably would have revealed anyway, if only asked.

I understand the privacy issues and agree with them, but I also realize that today's generations don't have the same concept of personal privacy inculcated the way mine did, and that the generation that posts its ongoing life stories on Facebook and Twitter is simply not going to feel the same horror about "everyone knowing their business".